use Azure Batch as Jenkins' node

Question

I have a Jenkins server that is running well with other machines as node. I have also a Azure Batch account and a working pool. Is there a way to connect both so that Jenkins tasks are sent to the Azure Batch pool?

So far I have only found this https://github.com/Azure/batch-jenkins that is a post-build plugin to execute tests in parallel, that's not what I am looking for. I just need to send a command line to Azure.

Thank you

Answer 1

As your requirement is to send a command line to Azure so I would suggest you to have a simple Jenkins job (either freestyle job or pipeline job) which would accomplish the requirement.

Pre-requisites:

1. Have an Azure Batch account
2. Have an Azure Batch pool
3. Have an Azure Batch job
4. Azure CLI installed in the Jenkins node where you would run the Jenkins job
5. Add Azure service principal to Jenkins credential as instructed here

Then have a Jenkins freestyle job executing commands similar to below one in shell build step after connecting to Azure CLI using Azure service principal.

az login --service-principal -u $AZURE_CLIENT_ID -p $AZURE_CLIENT_SECRET -t $AZURE_TENANT_ID

az batch task create --task-id mytask$i --job-id myjob --command-line "/bin/bash -c 'xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx; sleep 90s'"

Or else have a Jenkins pipeline job something like shown below.

#!groovy
node {
    try {
        xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
        xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
    }
    catch (MissingPropertyException e) {
        xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
        xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
    }
    stage('test'){
        withCredentials([azureServicePrincipal('JENKINSSERVICEPRINCIPALCREDENTIALID')]) {
            def sampleoutputone = sh (returnStdout: true, script: '''az login --service-principal -u $AZURE_CLIENT_ID -p $AZURE_CLIENT_SECRET -t $AZURE_TENANT_ID > /dev/null
            az account set -s $AZURE_SUBSCRIPTION_ID > /dev/null
            sampleoutputtwo=$(az batch task create --task-id mytask --job-id myjob --command-line "/bin/bash -c 'xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx; sleep 90s'")
            xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
            xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
        }
    }
}

P.S. Note that the code provided in this answer is just a sample one which you may have to tweak a bit to work as per your needs.

Hope this helps!! Cheers!!